Friday, March 29, 2013

Daddy Issues (Published Happily Here with the Blessing of my Dad)

When I watched my Dad walk someone else’s daughter partway down the aisle at her wedding,  it felt a bit like all of the scoops of ice cream from my childhood had fallen onto the dusty ground with an unceremonious splat.  Suddenly I was filled with a completely surprising emotion: jealousy.   Someone else was holding my single scoop of mint chocolate chip, and I was nine years old again, sitting amongst the congregants, holding an empty cone and feeling completely, unexpectedly bereft. This sadness sneaked up on me when I saw another young bride, not me, with her arm through my Dad’s arm on her wedding day, and this image crystallized how much my Dad and I both missed out on.
I feel compelled to say that I harbor absolutely no ill feelings toward my step sisters.  They are both incredibly lovely people.   It is a simple fact of circumstance that they both probably know my Dad better than I do.  They have both spent much more time with him.  He has greeted their prom dates at the door with intimidating, stoic handshakes.  He was there when they got their drivers licenses and received their acceptance letters from universities.  He should be part of their marriage celebrations, but he was not a part of mine. 
When my husband and I were married almost twelve years ago, I did not ask my father to participate in any way.  It did not seem appropriate at the time since back then he seemed like little more than an acquaintance to me.  (As a very young child, I refused to call him ‘Dad’.  I referred to him instead as “the boy with the beard.”  My grandmother laughed as if it were hilarious and cute, but it was neither.)  My mother’s name was on our wedding invitation, and I wanted her to walk me down the aisle.  (In the end her father did the honors, and that felt completely right and true to both of us.)
I didn’t give much thought to my father’s feelings twelve years ago.  There may have even been a small part of me that wanted to punish him for being absent during a lot of my childhood.  Thinking about it now, I expect that watching someone else walk his only daughter down the aisle must have felt a bit like having a sandbag dropped in his lap rendering him powerless; filling him with grief.  We didn’t get things right when I was a kid.  It is too late for me to build childhood memories with my Daddy, but it is not too late for me to love and be loved by my Dad.
Of course you know that I am a big girl.  I am completely fine.  But on rare occasions these emotions just ambush me and catch me completely by surprise.  This morning I was driving my youngest daughter to preschool when I realized that I was weeping irrepressibly.  I noticed ironically, as tears streamed determinedly down my face, that Christina Aguilera was crooning “Who-oh-oh!  I just want to feel this moment…” on my car’s speakers.  And there I sat, with a chirpy, happy three year old in the backseat, feeling the moment like nobody’s business.
I know that my Dad has regrets too, and we do not speak about our feelings aloud to each other because we don’t know what to say.  The words are swollen and sticky.  Some of them have sharp edges, and we are afraid they may hurt coming out.  We are afraid that we might not be able to pick up the broken pieces of ourselves after such a conversation.  We know that neither of us can change what has already been.
I have forgiven my Dad.  I have also forgiven his Dad, who was domineering and emotionally abusive to his sons and to my grandmother.  As I got older, I often wondered if my Dad assumed I’d be better off with an absent father than with an ever present and oppressive father like the one he had. (For the record my Dad is nothing like his father in that regard as far as I can tell.)  Still I have forgiven them both.  And I cannot turn back time.   I do not wish to turn back time or to try to erase the sadness.  In fact when the sadness visited me today, I invited it in.  And I sat with it.  The sadness used my hand to grab a pen and a small notebook, and we didn’t stop writing until the well ran dry.
My pen scribbled furiously across the pages of the little notebook I keep in my purse.  The pen scribbled and my eyes shed eager tears.  I felt full of grief and oh so alive all at once.  My other step sister is getting married next month.  Undoubtedly this impending occasion has brought my emotions to the surface, but it feels good to acknowledge that those feelings are there.  It feels good to acknowledge that I care, and that it is okay to not be completely fine.
Do you know what combats the sadness?
Feeling it intensely, and then letting it go.  Ignoring the sadness; keeping it tucked away, only allows it to bubble and ferment and permeate the happy places.  When it is tucked away, the sadness, disguised as anger, frustration, and fear, pokes its head up at nonsensical moments, and your kids may look at you and say, “What the heck, Mom?!”.  Sadness simply needs to be felt and then set free.  Simple things are often shockingly difficult, but today it all happened effortlessly for me.  I felt grieved and ecstatic all at once as I scribbled and cried and figuratively waved goodbye to my previously trapped sorrow.  Sometimes the sadness is hidden so deeply, you don’t even realize that it is there.  Your sadness will eventually capture your attention.  You may be driving or sitting at the Community Center waiting for your Zumba class to begin.  You may be vacuuming or thumping melons at the grocery store.  And you may be terrified, but you have to stop and feel it.  The world will not stop turning.
Do you know what brings healing and happiness between two people?
Finding common ground. 
It feels rapturous when my Dad and I discover the things we have in common.  It is true that we do not have a common history of sitting at the breakfast table telling knock knock jokes over bowls of cereal, but we do have shared stories and memories about my grandparents/his parents.  We were both slathered with love by my grandmother.  We were both aggravated and amused by my headstrong grandfather, and neither of us has to offer any background information when we launch into a story about the time when Papa loudly mispronounced the word ‘fajita’ when attempting to order lunch in mixed company or about all of the times my sweet grandmother grumbled under her breath when her husband showed his ass (figuratively, of course).  My Dad and I also have the same nose, the same exact taste in foods, and the same slightly fanatical appreciation for Elvis Presley.  We have newer memories birthed over glasses of wine and Pictionary challenges, and unabashed bird calls yelled at the top of our lungs on Sunset Beach.  My kids also have a Grandaddy, and a baggage-free relationship with the man who is my Dad, and that is the best thing about forgiveness and letting go.
I know that my Dad loves me and always has, but now I also know that I love him too, and saying it doesn’t feel awkward or false. 
My children gave me new eyes and new reasons to begin cultivating a new, grown up relationship with my Dad.  He was one of the only people on this earth who received a midnight call when my first daughter came ripping into the world, and when my new little family of three visited him and his family a few months later, a new book was opened.  All of us were united by our complete and utter infatuation with my little flat-headed, dimple-cheeked young’un.  Since then we have slowly been building.
Today I remembered that we are building atop tender soil, but we are building.
Keep building, and keep feeling.
And, in the words of Steve Perry: Don't Stop Believin'.
 
Love,
Meredith

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

All Within Five Minutes

My friends and I agree; half birthdays are killers for the under fives.  Did no one ever warn you about the "Terrible Two-and-a-Halfs"?  No?

Right now Lili is approaching her fourth half birthday (which means she is just about three and a half), and we have all been riding the emotional roller coaster with her.  One moment she may be wearing a pirate hat and collapsing into fits of giggles as she salutes and exclaims, "Lili Carson: reporting for duty!  DOOODIE?!? What's duty?"  The next moment she is a crumpled, heaving mass of blond hair, purple fleece and snot on the bedroom floor, inconsolable over the fact that her mama didn't salute back in the proper manner.

Here are a few photos I took over the course of five minutes yesterday helpfully narrated for your entertainment.

"Here you go, my love.  Would you like a bowl of cereal?"
 
"No? Cereal isn't pushing your buttons right now?"
 
"Come on, Dear.  Let's just try one bite, okay?"
 
"Hey!  That wasn't so bad was it?"
 
"Oh my goodness!  You've nearly eaten the whole bowl!"
 
"You were hungry!  I bet you feel loads better now."
 
"No?  Oh no.  Now what is it?"
 
Lather. Rinse, and Repeat about 60 times a day.
Happy Half-Birthday, Lil!


Tuesday, March 19, 2013

I Speak Fluent Blarney

Firstly, instead of reading this blog, you should go and read this one which persuasively pleads the case for not going completely overboard with our children for every single holiday.  Normally I completely agree, but this year, St. Patrick's Day fell on a Sunday, and no one was expecting anything of me.  Sunday is the day I typically like to cook and be obnoxious, so it turned out to be a perfect day to get a bit silly with holiday mirth.

Early in the afternoon we went bowling with lots of friends from church.  The fabulous person pictured below on the left made sure we all got in the Spirit of the holiday by showering us with green beads and festive temporary tattoos and by feeding us heavenly little squares of grocery store sheet cake, the kind you eat guiltlessly, pretending not to know that the icing is made out of partially hydrogenated Crisco and sugar, because it tastes like the sweet ambrosia of childhood.
Thanks, Mrs. Jenkins :)
 
So after a couple of hours of bowling with all of these adorable people, I was completely ready to do an Irish jig, cook an Irish stew, and orchestrate some leprechaun high jinks.
"Mom, what akshally IS a leopard-con?"
  
My two older daughters and one of their friends were there when we discovered that a wee leprechaun had indeed visited our house and paid a visit to the loo when no one was looking...
 


Later that afternoon we feasted on homemade Irish stew, green deviled eggs, and Paula Deen's green grits pie, which is a pie made out of grits and sugar and butter, all dyed green and topped with fresh whipped cream and strawberries.  You'll probably want to make it with your favorite little leopard-con the next time St. Patty's day falls on a weekend.
 
 Paula Deen's Green Grits Pie
from her Publication Paula Deen Celebrates

Ingredients:

1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup quick-cooking grits (not instant)
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
Green food coloring
3/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/4 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
One 9-inch frozen pie crust, thawed, or 1 refrigerated pie crust, unbaked, fitted into a 9-inch glass pie plate
1 cup whipping cream, whipped and sweetened with 1 tablespoon confectioner’s sugar and colored with 1 drop of green food coloring
Strawberries, for garnish

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.
2. In a small saucepan, bring 3/4 cup water and the salt to a boil. Add the grits, reduce the heat, cover, and cook over low heat for 5 minutes, stirring several times, until the grits are very think. Add the butter and 1 drop of food coloring and stir until the butter melts. Set the grits aside and allow them to cool slightly.
3. In a small bowl, stir together the sugar, flour, eggs, buttermilk, and vanilla. Stir well into the cooled grits. Pour the mixture into the pie crust. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until set.
4. Serve warm or cold with whipped cream, and garnish with strawberries.
 
 
May you always have
Walls for the winds
A roof for the rain
Tea beside the fire
Laughter to cheer you
Those you love near you
And all your heart might desire.
- Irish Blessing



Monday, March 18, 2013

Little Darlin', It's Been a Long, Cold, Lonely Winter

I am having blog deja vu.  I am fairly certain I have used the above blog title at least once before.  I wish I were actually singing, "Here comes the sun doot'n-doo doo... it's alright..." but I am still waiting for the sun.  As I sit here on March 18th, the sky is white and the snow is falling rather confidently outside my window.  Much like the fearsome Honey Badger, Michigan don't care that the first day of spring is two days away.

I have struggled this winter.  I have been very tired and lethargic and blah.  I have slept quite a bit, often unintentionally in the middle of the day.  On many days in February my bed seemed to magnetically draw me back to it after I had shuffled my older kids out to the school bus.  Lili, my three year old, would sit beside me watching Sesame Street, and when the show ended with Trash Gordon reminding everyone about the letter and number of the day, she would shake me violently and scream, "MOM!  You HAVE TO GET UP NOW!"  I'd be groggy and unresponsive, but I'd eventually drag myself to an upright position.  For the rest of the morning, I'd hate myself just a little bit.  And since I was in the self-loathing zone, I'd eat chocolate and avoid doing laundry at all costs.

On most evenings, I'd wander about the house with an ugly brown blanket draped over my shoulders like a heavy, leaden cape.  Often I'd scoop a child into the blanket with me and we'd cocoon up in bed or on the sofa where I'd moan about all of the things that I should be doing.  Of course if you saw me out at the Meijer, you'd might never know I was struggling so.  I'd smile and ask about your momma while I paused in the midst of browsing and wondering where I left my shopping list.

Now the days are starting to get longer, and on sunny days, you are sure to find me taking a few minutes to bask in the fabulous sunny spot that is my three year old's new big girl bed.  Sunny days are coming, but I am feeling defeated about the fact that I didn't beat my winter blues again this year.  Whatever.  Don't try to encourage me.  All you need to say is, "That's rough, Honey," because it is.    I don't want to hear about how blessed I am.  I KNOW this.  I love my family and my husband and my home and my lovely life.  Depression doesn't simply mean that I am failing to acknowledge all of the wonderful things in my life.  Often I look around at all of these things; I breathe in their wonderfulness, and I wish I could wake up and care more.

For me being depressed does not coincide with being unhappy.  I certainly experience many moments of joy and grace and gut-busting laughter all through the winter, but mostly I am sleepy and very low on energy.

Spring is coming, and I will tackle the beast again next year,


... but for now I'm coming out of my cocoon!  And I think I mean it this time.